Archive

Visiting Scholars

Open House | Disease and Social Order: The Plague Narratives of Thucydides and Lucretius, with Robert Cioffi

We were excited to welcome Robert Cioffi of Bard College for an Open House. The title of the discussion is “Disease and Social Order: The Plague Narratives of Thucydides and Lucretius”. The discussion took place on Thursday, April 2 at 11:00 a.m. EDT, live-streamed, and was recorded: scroll down to view the video. Robert introduces these narratives as follows: Thucydides wrote The History of the Peloponnesian War about the conflict between Athens… Read more

Travel

Troy: Myth and Reality, The British Museum | Part 2: Frescos, the Horse, Odysseus, and written transmission

When I first heard that the British Museum was putting on an exhibition “Troy: Myth and Reality” I knew I had to go, and I was so happy that friends from the Kosmos Society were able to visit at the same time so we could share the experience with each other. In this post we continue our series of impressions and highlights. Upon entering the first part of the exhibition… Read more

Travel

Troy: Myth and Reality, The British Museum | Part 1: The judgment of Paris, signs, and the role of Helen

Meeting with several members of the Kosmos Society in London in February was a wonderful experience. We went together to the amazing exhibition “Troy: Myth and Reality” at the British Museum. The British Museum was packed with fans of Homeric poetry, so we were among people sharing similar enthusiasm. Now we offer some of our highlights. Kosmos Society members ready to enter the exhibition The Troy Exhibition at the British… Read more

Visiting Scholars

Open House | Wives of Returning Veterans in Classical Athenian Drama, with Erika Weiberg

We were excited to welcome Erika Weiberg of Florida State University for an Open House. The title of the discussion is “Wives of Returning Veterans in Classical Athenian Drama”. The discussion took place on March 19 at 11:00 a.m. EDT; it was live-streamed and recorded. In preparation, you might like to read the PDF handout: Weiberg Kosmos Society Handout You can view the event on our YouTube channel. or in… Read more

Topic for Discussion

Dreams | Part 2: Dreams in later Greek texts

In part 1, we looked at dreams as represented in Homeric epic. In part 2, we continue our exploration with some passages from other texts. Starting with tragedy, we learn from Jean Alaux Lectures Tragiques d’Homère that “According to Jacques Jouanna, there are two types of dreams: the vision-dream which offers the sleeper a symbol to decipher … and the visitation–dream where a god or a messenger or a ghost… Read more